1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to railway cars for the transportation of motor vehicles, and more particularly to an arrangement for operating shiftable deck portions of the car which are movable to facilitate loading and unloading of vehicles.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Heretofore the counterbalancing mechanisms used for lifting and lowering the end deck portion of a rack car for automobiles employed a typical helical spring for operating a lever assembly which translated the force of the spring against the bottom of the hinged deck portion.
Due to the linear spring characteristics of such helical springs, difficulties have been experienced by the workmen in operating the deck, i.e., movement from an intermediate position of the deck to its uppermost position requires additional effort because of the linear decrease in the springs counterbalancing assistance. Similarly, movement from an intermediate position to the lowermost position of the deck requires manual effort to overcome the linearly increasing spring resistance.